


Shoes, danced to pieces

by MissTantabis



Category: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell & Related Fandoms, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (TV), Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell - Susanna Clarke
Genre: Angst, F/M, Monologue, Oneshot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-03
Updated: 2016-11-03
Packaged: 2018-08-28 21:21:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8463352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissTantabis/pseuds/MissTantabis
Summary: Lost Hope. A nightmarish place outside of reality. Emma Pole is forced to dance in this kingdom every single night. However even when she follows the King's wishes and shows him a genuie smile, her mind in reality speaks a different tale. Her views are dark and troubled, even more aggressive then the King can imagine...





	

Her feet graced the marble floor in swift and elegant moves. The dress, layers and layers around a small, fragile, mortal core, rustled. Steps in a rhythm that it felt like she was more sleepwalking then dancing. Her body and her mind seemed to be two separate things. The quiet, sad whisper of the lonely pipe, dancing in the wind filled her ears and her nerves translated that sound into the dance she was about to preform.

Emma Pole felt the Gentleman’s hands on her own fingers and hip. They were slowly spinning around each other. Together with over a dozen other dancers in this large hall. The marble floor was centred by a large, ancient tree. Green, blue glass on the ceiling. Ivory around pillars, that were half broken. Fair cyan light billowed through the room, without any source of where it came from. The air was crystal clear and cold as winter’s frost.

Lady Pole was wearing a long, silvery shimmering, white dress, stitched with pearls. Her hair had been tied up and a ribbon held it together. Icy tear-drops hung from it. A necklace of ivory leaves around her neck. It looked beautiful and otherworldly, yet Emma found no joy in this attire. It was just another sad reminder that she was in the hands of someone who had control over half her life, chaining her to his believes and fantasies. After all, all those dancers wore a similar attire. And some were in here far longer then her, if her keen eyes judged their clothing right. Was this gentleman over there really wearing a cloak from medieval times?

Emma was spun around in the King’s hold and lost sight of the medieval gentleman. Maybe it was good that she no longer had to see him. After all the indication formed a knot in her throat. Some people were in here for hundreds of years. And they looked roughly about her age. The King of Lost Hope made his own subjects. Fairies and mortals. And since they had the lifespan of a candle, they were trapped in a place, where time stood still. Nobody could die. Yet nobody really lived either. Was this what people called immortality? It tasted like a bitter medicine in Lady Pole’s eyes.

Her body felt numb. And yet her muscles kept moving. Her legs went forth and back, the feet following the steps the King required off her. She had to give him that: The Gentleman with the Thistledown Hair was a good dancer. He had a natural sense for rhythm and the brief glitter in his ice blue eyes told Emma that it probably was something he enjoyed quite a bit. Not that this eased Emma in any way. It only made her hate her predicament more. She had liked dancing when she had been younger. But now it had come with a new connotation, with fatigue and the taste of ash and blood in her mouth, with the pain of aching limbs.

The shoes, a pair of small, neat, deer-leather slippers, kept moving over the floor as swift as glass. However Emma could already feel the first cracks and threads loosing in her shoes. It always happened. Every night she danced so much she destroyed the shoes the King gave her. However that did not seem to matter for the Gentleman always gave her a new pair of slippers, made of all kinds of material: Glass, diamond, leather of all sorts of animals, pearls, gold and silver interwoven into it.

“Sir” Emma’s voice was calm and quiet, very polite, despite the strong hatred that boiled inside her veins. “May I please take a break? My shoes are falling apart and my feet ache.” The Gentleman tilted his head. His lips curled almost in disdain. The brows wandered upwards. “Why should you, my Lady?”, he replied, “Our dance has hardly begun and you already wish to part. I do not like it if a dance is unfinished.”

Lady Pole’s brows quivered briefly, however they did not furrow.  _ Tactic, Emma, tactic. _ The rumour was indeed true that Sir Walter sometimes asked her for strategical advice. The former Miss Wintertown was well read, well educated, charming and very clever. A highly intelligent woman for someone her age. And despite her predicament Lost Hope had taught her yet another art: The crafting of masks. The ways you move around a fairy king, which could kill you if you were not careful.

Emma slowly coiled her fingers around the Gentleman’s hand. Everything in her fumed with rage and disgust, but the mask she wore protected her. He wanted a charming, gentle woman, who felt honoured by his presence. She would give him that woman. Only to jab him in his back as soon as he turned away.

“I promise, I shall continue our dance as soon as I rested”, Lady Pole purred, “But please, your Majesty. Just a few minutes outside the castle. Five minutes. That is all I need. After that we can dance, until the sun rises.” Emma knew in the back of her head that this meant five more hours. She would hate every single one of them, but if he granted her a break, it would be worth it. Not that this was very likely.

The Gentleman slowly let go. He bopped his head and Emma replied with a courtesy. “Very well”, he replied, “Five minutes.” “Thanks, my Lord.” Lady Pole was glad that he turned away, because now she could let a brief scowl come over her face. My Lord. This fairy king was not her master. He had no right to keep her imprisoned and force her to dance with him. The paradox of her mask and the waking Emma sometimes even stunned Lady Pole.

Emma slowly trailed her way through the dancing pairs. She had seen the fairy king walk over to Stephen to dance with him. It made her cheeks blush in rage and her eyes flared. Lady Pole was not sure how he had gotten into this nightmarish realm, but she knew he was under the same enchantment as she was. And it made her very, very angry. He did not deserve this as little as did she. Sometimes Emma wondered why he was not fighting. Maybe because it had been drilled into him not to fight. He was a black man after all…

Outside the castle the wintry scenario continued. Frost grew on tree bark, the long, fair green grass and fog danced between hollow branches. Emma could spot several corpses in armour, hung on trees and pierced with thorns. Some had cobwebs spun over their open ribcage, some looked very fresh and some were in a state of decay. Their smells added a bitterly sweet aroma to the air.

Emma frowned in disgust and wrapped her arms around herself. She knew not far away from here was a small stream of water. She intended to go there and wash her feet and try to get a clear head. The path was mossy and Lady Pole had to jump over thorny veins that shot out of nowhere, trying to claw themselves into her clothes and legs. Lost Hope was the Gentleman’s ears and eyes. It breathed through him like a living being and defended its possessions viciously.

Finally Lady Pole reached the stream. Her ankles had a few cuts from the thorns and her shoes had broken even more apart. The water whispered and gurgled between the rocks. Emma carefully sat down on the shore. She slowly slipped off the shoes. By now the leather curled around the sole, which had several holes in it. The shoelaces were becoming loose as well. 

Lady Pole groaned and placed the leather shoes down besides her. She eyed her feet. The skin had become red and sweaty. Emma carefully thrusted them into the stream. She sighed as the cold water send a wave of shock down her spine. It woke her up and forced the fatigue out of her legs. Emma shuddered as she pulled her feet out of the water. The effect would only be temporary, but it was better then nothing.

Absentmindedly, the former Miss Wintertown carefully began to rub her feet to dry them. Her hands massaged the ankle, the palm, the rhythmical movements helped her to get a feeling back into her foot. It also made her block out the scenario for a couple of minutes. It made her mind blank. What a salvation a blank mind could be! Emma sometimes enjoyed this temporary forgetting. It helped her to not go completely insane and lose her hope. It was yet another mechanism of defence she had built up over the years.

Steps could be heard. They crunched over the frozen grass and then stopped. “Why”, the King’s clear and cool voice softly caressed her ear, “I must say, my Lady, you look rather fine by this shore.” Emma shrunk out of her absentmindedness. She cursed under her breath. Never ever let your guard down when you are in Lost Hope. Unless you really wanted to be choked by the nearest thorn whines.

Lady Pole turned her head to look at the Gentleman. He was standing there, in his green, velvet jacket, the dizzy twilight caught itself on his palettes. He was wearing purple, soft trousers and a pair of black, polished shoes. If there had not been this air of villainy and cold disinterest around him, Emma might have called him handsome. But it seemed that evil indeed distorted every form of beauty.

“I do?”, asked Emma. The Gentleman nodded and slowly folded his long fingered hands before his chest. “Yes, Lady Pole”, he replied, “You do. A crafter could not make a stature that resembles your beauty in this atmosphere. You would have honoured anyone as a resemblance for the moon goddess Selene.” The enchanted woman frowned. Beauty. That was all he saw. That was all that seemed to matter for him. Well, when he was around her at last.

Lady Pole replied: “I see.” She slowly rose. Carefully brushing over the dress, the woman asked: “Are my five minutes already over?” “Oh, yes, they are.” The fairy gave her a brief smile. “Time flies fast in here, my Lady.” The King slowly took a step towards her. “But it can also stay still. Depending on what I desire.”

Emma did not reply. Her brows furrowed. “Now, come”, the Gentleman purred and slowly offered her his hand, “Whip that frown of your fair face, my dear Lady, and join me in our dance once more. Trust me, it will be far better then the mundane life you live in the waking world. After all, who loves you there? Certainly not your husband. He locks you up in an attic, claiming you to be mad.”

_ Oh, and you claim to know what love is made off? _ Emma would have loved to let out a bitter laugh in his face, a very uncanny sound of sarcasm and vicious irony. She did not believe for one moment that this King loved anyone in this room. He did not know what love was. Love definitely was not the right to imprison a woman. Love was warm and soft like a bed of leaves and reliable. But his was as dark as the shadows underneath a poisonous bush and it grew thorny ranks to capture what it wanted and drag it into the abyss of misery.

Emma did not showed any of her thoughts. Instead she responded: “I would not scold Sir Walter too much. Yes, he may have his flaws, but nobody is perfect.” She really could not blame her husband for what had happened. Sure, she disliked how he treated her and hated the little help he gave her. But if there was a person, she should blame, it was Mr. Norrell. He had sold her to this creature and she had no say in this matter whatsoever. Emma still hoped she could make him pay for this one day.

Lady Pole took the offered hand. “But I suppose we should not dwell on these matters.” Even if she was saying it as her mask, she even meant it. Emma would forbid herself to talk about her predicament to the King of Lost Hope. That was not what she had been taught in her younger years. Ladies do not whine, ladies complain and scheme when nobody is watching.

The King of Lost Hope smiled as he slowly closed his long fingers around her own hand. It was the hand that was lacking half of her pinkie finger in the waking world. The touch send a humming sound through her entire body like someone played a violin inside her. The enchantment reacted to its caster and Emma angrily swallowed the blood, the taste of ash and her pride as she allowed herself to be lead back to the ballroom.

There the sad, melancholic tone of the pipe remained the same and filled her ears. The dancers swirled passed her. The King of Lost Hope took her gloved hand and slowly bopped his head. His icy lips graced her palm. The official greeting was done. Emma forced her face back into a neutral and calm expression and tried to make herself forget once more. She allowed the Gentleman to take the lead. And as they started to waltz, hand on hand and hip, only separated by an inch, feet moving on their own accord, Lady Pole felt the remains of her shoes fall into pieces until she was as bare in this place as an infant, deemed for sacrifice.


End file.
